A technique is known that includes selecting distribution information on the basis of behavior information representing the behavior of a user, and transmitting the selected distribution information to a terminal device of the user (see, for example, Patent Literature (PLT) 1). Here, for examples, the behavior information is “position information” indicating the position of the user terminal, or “purchase information” indicating the merchandise that the user has purchased.
A server apparatus according to PLT 1 includes a registrant file in which information of users possessing a user terminal is registered, and a purchase history file in which the purchase history is collected and registered. The server apparatus according to PLT 1 also includes a position information file (behavior pattern file) in which positions associated with the behavior of the registrants are collected by using the Global Positioning System (GPS), and an advertisement request file containing distribution information representing an advertisement. The server apparatus according to PLT 1 extracts the registrant to whom the distribution information representing the advertisement is to be transmitted, on the basis of the purchase history file, the behavior pattern file, and the advertisement request file.
The related technique according to PLT 1 enables transmission of the distribution information appropriately selected on the basis of the behavior information of the user, such as the purchase information or the position information (in other words “personalized service”) to the user terminal.
The behavior information of the user is, however, privacy information of the user providing the information. Accordingly, the user may be reluctant to allow the service provider to specify the user's behavior information.
Therefore, techniques related to the present invention for dealing with the mentioned issue have been proposed (see, for example, PLT 2). A data processing apparatus according to PLT 2 acquires the user's behavior information and provides the acquired information to a service providing apparatus. At the time of the provision, however, the data processing apparatus according to PLT 2 determines whether or not the acquired behavior information is to be hidden, on the basis of a user disclosure policy and so on. The data processing apparatus according to PLT 2 then substitutes the behavior information determined to be hidden with pseudo behavior information, and provides the substituted information to the service providing apparatus. Through such a procedure, the technique according to PLT 2 hides the user's behavior information if need be, to thereby protect the privacy information.